Typical wireless devices utilizing protocols such as WiFi (i.e., the IEEE 802.11 standard, etc.) do not actively monitor other available wireless access points during an active connection. With such an arrangement, a wireless device monitors available access points (e.g., via beaconing signals, etc.) only after termination of a first wireless connection with an access point. Such an arrangement can result in delayed changeover among access points and, in some cases, loss of data.
Loss of data is particularly problematic with medical systems that allow the physiologic data of multiple, remotely-located patients to be monitored from a central location are known in the art. Such systems are being increasingly adopted and acquire physiologic data of respective patients and transmit the data over a radio frequency RF (i.e. wireless) link to a centralized monitoring station. This physiologic data can include, for example, real-time electrocardiograph (ECG) waveforms, blood pressure, pulse oximetry, respiratory rate, CO2 levels, temperature readings and the like. In the transmission and reception of real-time physiologic data over a network, link disruption, the loss of network connections without warning, the failure to establish network connections or even a slight degradation of service/signal in the network can have serious consequences for time-critical medical data.